


Not Exactly Human

by discordiansamba



Category: Danny Phantom
Genre: Gen, Identity Reveal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-28
Updated: 2016-03-01
Packaged: 2018-05-23 15:58:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,571
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6121762
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/discordiansamba/pseuds/discordiansamba
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Exactly how far away from being human do you have to be to have your limbs grow back?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Not Exactly Human

Jazz blew out warm air onto her hands, rubbing them together in an attempt to stay warm. She could already feel herself start to shake from the bitter cold that had embraced Amity Park that winter- a cold snap for the ages, they said, schools were closed and nobody was really out on the streets. Everyone was huddled up inside, gathering around the warm fireplace, and staying out of the bitterly cold air outside. Snow had started to fall, which was almost enough to convince Jazz that she would turn back around in ten minutes and head back home if her search turned up nothing, and wait for the oncoming snowstorm to tide over before she went back out again, in search of her missing brother.

She felt her heart clench a little as she remembered what had happened three days ago, that had caused Danny to vanish seemingly into thin air. She thought it would be just another routine day for them- that is until Phantom ended up getting left his arm loped off by the Guys in White in front of the entire student body of Casper High School. Jazz had screamed and had tried to desperately race after the horrified ghost boy as he got as much distance as he could between the Guys in White and himself, but she had been held back by Mr. Lancer, who told her it was 'dangerous.'

They had cut her brother's arm off! Her little brother!

Sam, Tucker, and herself had scoured the streets of Amity Park then, desperately searching for Danny, or for Phantom, but they had found not even a single trace of him. What were they going to do? Was Danny going to be okay? He'd been injured before, but nothing this serious, nothing like this. What would they do? How would they explain this to their parents?

And where was Danny?

Three days.

He hadn't been home for three whole days, ever since that had happened. The Guys in White had collected the loped off arm, and had left, and she was deeply worried that they had managed to collect her brother as well. What if she never saw him again? What if even now, he was strapped to some lab table, being dissected and studied? Was there nothing that she could do about this?

She had told Danny that she wanted to help him, but when it had mattered most, she was just so utterly useless.

"Jazz."

The quiet voice, barely above a whisper, caught her ears, and she whirled to confront the source of it, relief flooding through her body when she found familiar blue eyes meeting her own, although they looked worn from lack of sleep. He didn't seem all that bothered by the cold, but she knew that something was very wrong when her relief at seeing her brother again gave way to realization that there was an expression that she didn't like to see on his face, as if he was reluctant to see her.

"Danny!" She cried out, trying to push it aside for the moment, hurrying to embrace him tightly in her arms. Oh, he was so cold! But she could still feel his heart beating in his chest, so he was still alive, at any rate. Her worst fears, the fears that he had died from his injury or that he had been captured by the Guys in White, turned to dust as she held her frigid brother tight to her chest, not wanting to let him go for all of the world. 

"Oh Danny, we were so worried about you!" She said, letting him go, placing her hands on his face, cupping it in between them. "Where have you been? What about the Guys in White? Oh, and Danny your arm-" Her breath, however, caught in her throat as she finally found her eyes traveling towards the aforementioned left arm, and she froze in her tracks.

The material of Danny's jacket didn't hang loose from the missing arm as she thought it would, but instead it seemed as if it contained something very much intact. Danny caught her expression, and a look of almost shame crossed his face, though he quickly tried to bury it underneath one of his signature quick grins. "Yeah, about my arm..." He trailed off, pulling the fabric of his left sleeve all the way up with his right hand, laughing nervously as he held out what was underneath it for her to see. "It's growing back."

And sure enough, it was. His left arm, which had been cut off at his shoulder, now appeared as if it ended just underneath his elbow instead, the rest of it left to expose bones, that appeared to be made of solidified ectoplasm, glowing green but appearing very solid none the less. The new arm itself was a sight paler than the rest of her brother, although it was only noticeable when compared to the rest of him.

"How on earth..." Jazz stammered, reaching out to touch it, as if to confirm that this was in fact real. His left arm, which should have still been missing, was cold to the touch, and she felt Danny flinch when she clutched it too tightly. "This shouldn't be possible." She said dumbly.

"I know." Danny laughed a little, pulling the half formed arm away from her, tucking the bony hand into the pocket of his jacket. "Trust me, I know that, Jazz. But you know, it's a good thing, right?" He gave her something of a bitter laugh, clearly trying to suppress his real feelings on this issue. "Now I won't have to worry about going through life one handed. I guess I can regenerate!"

"Danny..." Jazz began, placing a hand on his right shoulder, concern flooding her eyes. Oh no, she knew what thoughts were really flying through her brother's head, he didn't even need to voice them. "It's okay Danny. It's going to be just fine." She promised him, pulling her brother close.

"Fine." Danny said shortly, shaking his head, phasing through Jazz's embrace. "Jazz, how is any of this fine? I'm growing back an entire arm!" He shouted, throwing up his good arm. "That's not... that's not something normal humans do, that's not..." He turned to look at his sister again, despair and confusion evident in his eyes. "Jazz, I've known that ever since the accident, I was never going to be the same anymore, I was never going to be quite human anymore, and I thought I was starting to come to terms with that, I really did but..."

He shook his head, pulling out the half formed left arm again, eyes fixated on the bones made of solid ectoplasm. "Look at this thing." He told her, disgust crossing his face. "I shouldn't be able to do this. It's not right, it's not human, it's just..." He turned back to his sister, desperate, pleading for someone to tell him otherwise, to turn him away from his current line of thinking. "It's a lot more like I'm some kind of monster."

"No, Danny, no." Jazz shook her head, taking the bone hand in her own, even as Danny flinched and tried to pull it away from her. She smiled at him, cupping the skeleton hand in her own. "This doesn't make you some kind of monster." She told him. "Danny Fenton, my little brother, is not a monster, he's a hero and a good kid besides that."

"I feel like a monster." Danny told her, looking away, although he ceased trying to pull his hand away from her. "This damn thing makes me look kind of like a monster too. I just... I thought I was more human than this, Jazz." He told her, facing his sister once again. "That's what they said, half-human, half-ghost. But I feel like I'm less human than I should be."

"You're plenty human." Jazz reassured him, letting go of his hand. "And your arm will be fine. Looking at the rest of it, it'll all go back to normal soon enough." She told him, watching as he tucked the arm back away in his pocket, hiding the bony portion from sight once again. "Look Danny, I know a lot about human nature- I study it, after all, even if I am still an amateur. And trust me, you're _human._ "

"As much as I want to say that you're right Jazz, I just wish that was more apparent in the physical sense." He gave her a rueful smile. "I don't know what I'm supposed to do. I thought about coming home, about talking to mom and dad... but I don't want them to see this. This isn't how I want them to find out I'm Phantom, Jazz. I don't... I don't want them to think of me as less of a person."

"They wouldn't." Jazz told him softly. "And for what it's worth, Sam blurted out that you were captured by ghosts, so they have no idea where it is that you've been." She said, placing a hand on his shoulder. "Why don't we just get you home for now, and we'll do something about your arm, okay? They don't even have to see it, Danny, if you don't want them to."

"I would really like to come home." Danny admitted, looking up at her. "Can I, though?" He asked, eyes drifting back towards his concealed left hand. "Can I come back?"

"Yes." Jazz told him, nodding her head, feeling her heart clench in her chest. He wasn't just asking if he could walk home with her, or something as simple as that- he was asking if he was allowed back home. In a place with other humans. As if he no longer felt that he belonged among them, not anymore. "You can _always_ come back home, Danny. It will always _be_ your home."

"Thank you." He said, his voice barely above a whisper. "Thank you Jazz. You have no idea how much that means to me."

"It's okay, little brother." Jazz said, embracing him again, holding him as tight as she could, until her warmth seeped into his bones. "Everything is going to be just fine."


	2. No More Lies

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They used to share everything, and now the only thing she gets from him is lies.

"Danny, do you have a moment?" Maddie asked, looking up as she heard her son head down the stairs. He flinched when she noticed him, and winced a little when she frowned, knowing that he had been caught.

"Sorry mom, I was about to head over to Sam's house." Danny said, and she already knew that for a lie. Almost everything that came out of her son's mouth these days was a lie. Where he was, what he was doing, who he was with... it was like he had become something of an alien to her, a stranger that she didn't know, one that just happened to look like her son.

And they used to be so close.

"Oh, I see." Maddie said, frowning a little, before shaking her head, standing up, her eyes firm. "No, actually, you're going to wait a few minutes Danny. I really do need to talk to you, young man. I'm still not entirely convinced you're okay." She told him, noticing her son wince again when she said that. It had been about five days ago now, that her son had gone missing for a three day period, only to be brought back home by Jazz.

Sam had claimed that he had been taken by ghosts, but Maddie was skeptical. At the very least, aside from appearing as if he lacked sleep and being a little hungry, her son seemed alright, sound and whole.

Well, almost, she thought her eyes drifting towards her son's left hand, which he had been wearing a glove over ever since he got back home. He didn't say anything about it, nothing to draw her attention to it, but the lengths he took to keep it out of sight was noticeable to her. She wasn't exactly an idiot, she knew something was going on with her son, and she was going to find out what it was.

"Are you sure it can't wait, because Sam is sort of expecting me. We were going to work on our homework together." Danny told her, rubbing his neck with his right hand, averting his eyes. Another lie, she thought. Her son might be lying all the time these days, but he hadn't actually gotten any better at it.

"No, it can't." Maddie said firmly, shaking her head. "It's been waiting long enough to be honest Danny. I need to have a good talk with you." She told him.

"About what?" Danny asked, but she didn't miss how he had visibly paled at her question, nor how his eyes had filled with dread. "Is it about being captured because like I told you, my memory's pretty hazy."

"It's not about that." Maddie said, shaking her head. She and Jack had asked him about that, of course they had, they had been worried sick about him, but he had been very unforthcoming. Jazz simply claimed that she found him 'wandering about in a daze'. "Why don't you come down to the lab with me Danny, and we'll have a nice talk?" She asked him. "It's the most private place in the house, at any rate."

"Okay, but I can't really see what could possibly be so important." Danny frowned, doing a pretty good job at keeping up his act of not visibly panicking. Anyone else would be fooled by it, but well, Maddie was not anyone else. He followed her down to the lab, looking everywhere but at her. He felt strangely ill at ease down here, realizing that this was the first time he had been down here since _that_ had happened.

Danny wished it never had, because in spite of his sister's reassurances, he couldn't get rid of the deep sense of horror that he had ever since he first realized that his left arm was growing back. Sure, it seemed like a good thing on the surface, it would have been really hard to explain away why Danny Fenton, normal, average kid, would have had the same arm suddenly chopped off as Phantom, but at the same time, well-

He didn't feel human anymore.

He knew what they called him, half-ghost, half-human. And there were a lot of things about him that weren't normal, but he could deal with those things.

Not this though.

He couldn't deal with this.

"Mom, is this really necessary?" Danny asked, glancing around, looking about the lab. Suddenly all of the various ghost hunting equipment, scattered about the lab in various states of completion, looked far more intimidating than before. "I really do have to get to Sam's." He said again, glancing back up towards the door.

"No Danny, it is." Maddie said, turning to look at him. "Danny, honey, lately I've been noticing that you haven't be honest with your father and I, and it's worrying me." She confessed to him. "I just feel as if you're hiding something from us, and I'm worried that it's something important. I don't really like that."

"Mom, I'm not hiding anything from you." Danny told her, shaking his head, but she knew that nervous smile meant she had hit the mark. "I promise. I don't know where you got that idea to be honest."

"Danny." Maddie told him frankly, locking eyes with him. "I know you are lying to me." She said. "Please just stop already."

Danny opened his mouth, as if he had a retort to say to that, but he quickly shut it, looking away from his mother. He knew that he had reached the end of his rope here, but he felt less like telling her now more than he ever had in his entire life. How could he tell his mother about any of this now? He felt his left hand clench into a fist inside his pocket, eyes narrowing as he felt the unnatural feeling of bones. Most of his arm had already regenerated, but his hand was still in bone form, a constant reminder of how inhuman he actually was.

No, Danny tried to fight off that line of thinking. That wasn't true- he was human. His heart still beat (but slower than it should), he breathed (except when didn't), and- this line of thinking wasn't helping him either. "Mom, I'm not..." He trailed off, searching for something, anything to say to her, but was unable to find a single thing. Should he just come clean and confess to her? He didn't have to show her anything, after all. But then, no, everyone knew that the Guys in White had taken Phantom's left arm clean off, and here her son was, clearly with a left arm.

And if her son was also Phantom, then that could only mean one thing.

"I don't... I don't know what to tell you." Danny said finally, his right hand raising up to his left arm, clenching it tightly to his body. She took notice of this action, but it would seem Danny missed it himself, unable to look at his mother. "Mom, I-"

The doorbell rang then, and Danny almost let out a sigh of relief. Oh thank God, a distraction, he thought, now glancing over towards his mother.

Maddie frowned, glowering up the stairs as the doorbell was rung a second time. Finally, she heaved a sigh, giving her son a long look, telling him that she wasn't done with him yet. "Wait right here, Danny, and I'll be right back down. I'm going to go see who that is." She said, patting her son on the shoulder lightly, as if to convey that she wasn't actually angry with him- she was a bit worried that he thought that.

"Yes?" Maddie asked, opening the door, and paused as she saw who it was. She would recognize these men- and their occupation- anywhere, and sure found herself pursing her lips, wondering what the Guys in White could want. A consultant, perhaps, she found herself thinking with some excitement- after all, she like everyone else had heard that they had obtained a rather large sample of Phantom- his left arm. What she wouldn't give to be able to study that!

"Madeline Fenton?" One of the men asked, staring down at the petite woman.

"Yes, that's me." She said, nodding her head slowly. "To what do I owe this visit? It's not everyday the government's own ghost hunters show up on your doorstep." She observed. "Can I be of some use to you gentlemen?"

"We're actually here in concerns to your son." One of the agents answered. "Is Daniel Fenton at home?"

Maddie's eyes narrowed at the question, but her facial expression otherwise remained perfectly the same. "No." She said slowly, lying through her teeth. "I'm afraid he's not home at the moment. Most likely he's spending time with one of his friends." She told them, unsure why her very first reaction had been to lie to these people. What could they want with her son, though? Somehow the idea of allowing Danny to spend any time around these people did not sit well with her, and it was something that she wanted to see to it that was to be avoided.

"What do you want with my son?" She asked, phrasing her question innocently enough. She was suspicious however, she couldn't help being so. She felt a cold chill up down the back of her spine, and she already knew from years of experience what that meant- but she said nothing and didn't react to it. The agents, it seemed, noticed nothing as well. "He's not involved in anything dangerous, is he?" She asked, lacing her voice with concern, concern that was actually quite genuine.

After all, one didn't get government agents on their door asking questions without being involved in something of note.

"We want to question him about his involvement with Phantom." One of the agents told her, clearly gauging her expression.

Maddie gave him nothing, even though her mind was churning a mile a minute. "I'm afraid you're barking up the wrong tree then, gentlemen, so to speak. My son has no connection with Phantom." She told them. "Don't you think we would notice if he did? I'm going to have to ask the both of you to leave, and if I find out that you, or any other members of your agency have been anywhere near my son, I'm going to have more than just words with you." She said, her voice carrying a threat on it, one that she was more than willing to back up.

"I'm afraid we can't do that, ma'am, we do have our orders to-" One of the officers began, but Maddie cut him short.

"I don't care about your orders, gentlemen. You will be conveying that to your higher ups, and you will be removing yourself from my property. Unless either of you gentlemen have a warrant of some kind?" She asked them, quirking a brow. The men exchanged a quick look and she knew that she had them. "I didn't think so. Kindly take your leave. _Now."_

"Very well." One of the agents narrowed his eyes, and Maddie promptly shut the door in their faces. It wasn't until she heard them leaving the premise that she let out a deep breath, her shoulder slumping somewhat. She shook a little, placing a hand on the door to steady herself, taking in and letting out a deep breath.

The Guys in White, for whatever reason, had their sights set on her son. Because they thought he had some kind of a connection with Phantom. Maddie wasn't a fool, she had long since suspected something like that herself- after all, as much as she hated to admit it, there were so many uncanny similarities between her son and the ghost boy. But it was the timing, more than anything, that struck a cord with Maddie.

The Guys in White had just obtained a large sample of Phantom, his left arm. It had been nearly a week since then, so they had plenty of time to study it. And now here they were, on her doorstep, asking about her son and being rather insistent about it. If she didn't miss her guess, they might just show back up later, this time with a warrant, and she wasn't entirely sure what she would do then.

The cold presence that had been lingering behind her slowly started to move, leaving her side. Her gaze slowly shifted in it's direction, and she lingered by the door a little until she could feel the cold sensation vanish altogether. She waited there, by the door, long enough until she was sure that it had returned back to the lab, and waited longer still, trying to steady herself, her brain being assaulted by a rapid fire succession of thoughts.

The only thing that didn't fit was the left arm, and Maddie's stomach clenched a little, a somewhat nauseating idea forming in her mind about that.

Taking in and letting out a deep breath, Maddie erased any traces of suspicion from her face, and headed back downstairs, where she found Danny, sitting in a chair and doing his best not to look nervous. His right hand had found it's way to his left arm again, clenching at the fabric of his long sleeved shirt. He looked up as she came downstairs, trying and failing to give her a small smile, to not let his worry and doubt show on his face.

"Oh, hey." He greeted her. "Who was that at the door?" He asked, but Maddie knew that he already knew the answer to that question.

"Just someone trying to sell something." Maddie told him, keeping her expression neutral. "I told them we weren't interested." She smiled at him, standing in front of her son, who seemed to tense a little as she approached, almost as if he expected her to strike out at him. "Now then young man, I want to see your left arm."

That did cause a reaction in him, and she could see the rising tide of panic in his eyes, his right hand clenching tighter around the arm in question. "Uh, why?" He asked, blinking slowly. "It's not like there's anything special about it."

"You mean other than how you've been trying to keep it out of sight ever since you came back home?" Maddie asked, lifting her brows. "I'm your mother Danny, I notice these things. I notice more than you possibly even know. Now let me see it. If there's nothing strange about it, then there's no reason to hide it from me in the first place, now is there?"

"Mom, please." Danny begged her, looking away again. "Anything but that."

"Sweetie." Maddie heaved a sigh, kneeling down so that she was at his level, placing a face on his hand. His skin was cold, always so cold, ever since he had the accident with the Fenton Portal a year ago. She had dissected cadavers before, and the icy feeling of her son's cheek reminded her more of them than it did of a living person. "It's alright, Danny. I'm your mother. That means I'm going to love and accept you, no matter what."

"Now then, let me see." Maddie quickly said, catching her son off guard as she quickly reached down, plucking the glove rather effortlessly off of his left hand. However, when her eyes fell on what it hid, it slipped from her hands, color draining from her face. Danny quickly moved to hide it inside of his sleeve, but he wasn't fast enough, wasn't fast enough to prevent his mother from seeing the glistening of bone, glowing an unnatural shade of green, a shade she was very much familiar with in her line of work.

"Oh honey." Maddie gasped out, covering her mouth with a hand, her eyes wide. "Oh honey." She whispered.

Danny could feel his heart pound in his chest, his left hand tightly clenched in a fist underneath the safe haven of his sleeve. The feeling of it made him want to vomit, however, the feeling of the bones entwined with each other, not a trace of skin or muscle in sight yet. And his mother, probably the last person in the world that he had wanted to see him like this, had seen that- she'd seen his hand, she had seen the glowing bone and she knew, she knew now that her son wasn't human anymore, wasn't normal, wasn't natural...

"Mom please." Danny begged, his voice so low he wasn't even sure that she could hear him. "Don't hate me."

Instead he found himself wrapped in his mother's warm arms, his head pulled close to her chest, so close that he almost couldn't breathe. "Danny, no, honey." She whispered. "I could never hate you, never ever." She said, shaking her head, streaming tears trickling down her cheeks. "I love you, Danny. I love ever part of you. I don't care... I don't care about this, or anything else, or any kind of connection that you have with Phantom. I love you, Danny."

"I'm sorry, mom." Danny told her back, finding himself unable to return the embrace just yet. "You're right, I've been keeping a lot of things from you and dad, things that I probably should have told you a long time ago. There was just never a good time, and after awhile I became so afraid to say anything because I thought... I thought..."

"You thought we would reject you." Maddie finished for him, running a hand through his hair as she pulled back. "Never, not in a million years Danny." She told him. "I just don't understand how any of this could have happened to you."

"It's a long story." Danny said, giving her a small smile. "Can I have the glove back now, though?" He asked, averting his eyes from her once more, that smile quickly fading.

Maddie could only lean down, snatching up the fallen glove, handing it back to her son without commentary. She wanted to say something, anything, to reassure her son- but what was she supposed to say in this instance? Dimly, it occurred to her that the Guys in White had cut off her son's arm- and that not long ago she had been excited at this prospect. No wonder then, that Danny would be afraid of telling them anything. She couldn't blame him.

"Thanks." Danny said, taking it from her with his right hand, his left still hidden from sight. There was a long pause then, as if he wanted to say something to his mother, but couldn't find the right words for it. Then slowly, he removed his left hand from his sleeve, finding himself just staring at it for a few moments. "Mom I..." He began, uncertain of what he was going to say.

"I'm not sure I know what I am anymore." He whispered.

"You're Danny Fenton." Maddie told him, watching as he tugged the glove back on over his hand, noticing where strands of muscle had begun to emerge around his wrist. "My son. And that's all that really matters."

Danny looked up at her then, and the doubt in his blue eyes tugged at her heart. "I really hope that's true."


	3. They've Got Questions They Want to Ask

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He had a feeling that he wasn't going to be able to avoid them forever.

"Daniel James Fenton?"

The voice alone was enough to make him freeze, a bolt of fear running through him. He would know that tone anywhere, after all, they all spoke in that same authoritative tone, devoid of any real emotion. He had joked with Tucker and Sam about it at first, making jokes about them really being robots, but now, somehow, that voice was terrifying. All he wanted to do was pull his jacket's hood closer about his face and sink into the ground, anything to avoid what was coming next.

But instead he turned to face them, staring down the two nearly identical agents. The only thing that set the pair apart was the color of their skin, as if the Guys in White recruited only lookalikes to staff their agency. "The Guys in White, right?" Danny asked, trying to bite back his fear. "Uh, can I help you two?"

"We have some questions we need to ask you in regards to your association with known spectral menace, Phantom." The other agent told him, holding up a sheet of paper that Danny knew right away was a warrant. His mother had told them to come back with one, but really, he hadn't expected them to approach him at his school, instead of at home. He guessed that they wanted to avoid his mother, which would be funny, if the situation were not so serious.

"My association?" Danny asked them, putting on his best befuddled expression. Just his luck to be confronted when there weren't any people around- everyone else had already gone home for the day, including Sam and Tucker, but Danny had to stay behind to get a packet of work he had missed from the last week. "What, you mean by being the son of two ghost hunters?" He asked them. "I've never really even so much have been in the same room as Phantom. I'm not really sure what it is that you two gents expect me to know about him, but I think you're kind of asking the wrong kid. Have you tried Paulina? I know she gets her butt saved by Phantom like, once every two weeks or something. She might know something about him."

"We've already spoken to the Sanchez girl, and the only thing we got from her was how dreamy the ghost kid was." One of the agents rolled his eyes, that hint of disgruntlement doing nothing to humanize them. "I'm Operative O, and this is Operative K. You can either come with us quietly, or we can use force. We've been authorized to deal with you either way."

That settled any doubts that Danny might have had about the extent of the Guys in White's knowledge about him. They might not know the why, how, or what of it, but they were certain beyond a shadow of a doubt that Danny Fenton had connections with Phantom- and strong ones at that. He had one of two options now- he could try and make a break for it, and cement this idea, or he could go with them peacefully, and he could attempt to talk his way out of this. Still, he didn't like the idea of being lead off to who knows where by the Guys in White, so after a moment's consideration, he gave them his best grin, hoping that they didn't notice he was afraid.

"Sure, I'll go peacefully. I don't have anything to hide, after all." Danny told them. "But on one condition- we'll be having this conversation inside of the school." He said, locking eyes with the one holding the warrant, challenging him to say anything otherwise. "Or I'll call my mom."

That did make the agent, K, Danny recalled, flinch, just like he thought it would, and the man could been seen narrowing his eyes underneath his sunglasses. "Very well. But someplace private." He turned to his partner then. "Operative O, go acquisition the use of a teacher's office."

O nodded his head shortly, before heading towards what Danny knew was Mr. Lancer's office. The boy narrowed his eyes for a moment, for the first time noticing that he seemed to be carrying some kind of metal briefcase with him, suddenly feeling strangely more ill at ease. He could almost feel a faint tug towards it, and found himself clenching and unclenching his left hand in response, a tingle running up his newly regrown arm. He didn't exactly like that feeling.

At the very least, his left arm had regenerated in full now, leaving no trace of the gut wrenching bones in sight. It was a little awkward and hard to move at times, and he still didn't have full control over his grip strength (he had crushed a glass just this morning without meaning to), but at the very least, it looked like a human arm again. His mother had agreed to hold off on talking with Jack until his arm had recovered, and until Danny was ready, for which he was grateful.

Now though, he could probably use one of his father's overly boisterous interruptions.

Apparently, requisitioning the use of the office meant forcing the previous occupant out, and it wasn't long until a very disgruntled Mr. Lancer was forced out of his office. When he saw who it was the Guys in White wanted to talk to, his eyes widened in surprise, before narrowing again, turning towards Operative O. "What exactly do the two of you want with Daniel Fenton? I'll have you know he's one of my students, and I don't intend to let some shady government officials talk to him without the presence of any other adults."

"We have a warrant." K told him shortly, holding up the piece of paper for Mr. Lancer to read. The vice principal all but snatched it from the man, reading it over, his grip on the paper growing tighter and his expression angrier as he read.

" _Fahrenheit 451!_ You got a warrant to question a barely fifteen year old boy?!" Mr. Lancer demanded, shoving the warrant back into K's face. "He's a teenage boy, not a criminal!" He told them, placing a firm hand on Danny's shoulder. For once, Danny actually felt almost glad to have Mr. Lancer around- he had to admit, he didn't exactly expect him to put up this much of a fight. "Give me one good reason why I should leave him alone with the two of you."

"Because we're currently authorized to arrest anyone who gets in our way." Operative O told him sternly, eyes narrowing. "We only want to ask him some questions, after all."

"If the only thing you want to do with the boy is ask him a few questions, then I don't understand why such a warrant is needed." Lancer narrowed his eyes. "I'm not letting you take Daniel Fenton anywhere, Gentlemen. If you want to ask him questions, you can do so with me, or another member of the staff present, but I refuse to leave him alone with you."

"Very well then." K narrowed his eyes, handing the warrant over to his partner. "Then as I am currently authorized to do so, I'll be placing you under arrest." He told him, pulling out a pair of handcuffs that Danny couldn't help but wonder where he had been keeping them.

"Wait, no, hold up!" Danny protested. He couldn't let them arrest Lancer, after all. "Mr. Lancer, it's okay. I'll be fine, really. They... just want to ask me a few questions after all. I'm sure this is all just some sort of government required formality." He told him, grinning at him, though he knew that it faltered a little. "There's no need to arrest him, Operative K, was it? He's just trying to do his job, just like the two of you."

"Mr. Fenton, these two don't have the right-" Lancer began, but Danny cut them off.

"They have a warrant. Technically, they do." Danny shrugged his shoulders. "But I'll be fine, Mr. Lancer, promise. Why don't you just go and grade some papers or something?" He asked him, before turning back to the two operatives. "Alright then, so why don't I get to answering those questions of yours? Because I have a lot of homework to take care of and I want to get on it as soon as I can."

The two operatives exchanged glances, but K eventually put away the handcuffs, not before giving Mr. Lancer a long look before they lead Danny into his office, locking the door behind him. Operative O placed the metal briefcase down at Lancer's desk, while K took a seat in the man's chair. Danny took the only other seat in the cramped office, and found Operative O moving to stand in front of him. Without much warning he grabbed both of Danny's hands, clamping a glowing pair of handcuffs over them before he even knew it.

"Just a precaution." O gave him a cold smile as Danny gritted his teeth, tugging against them, before he went to stand in front of the door, blocking his only avenue of escape. Danny could feel his powers being blocked off by the cuffs, which didn't seem to want to come loose.

"Do you know why you've been brought here?" K asked him, locking eyes with the half ghost.

"No, not really. I've got even less of an idea as to why you two cuffed me." Danny shook his head, trying to look rather helpless, even though anger was broiling inside of him. Didn't he have rights? "To be honest, I'm a bit lost about all of this. I don't have any association with Phantom, other than being the son of two people who hunt him. Other than that, I've never even talked to the guy. I'm sort of confused as to what kind of connection the two of you think that I have with him."

"You can cease the act, kid." K told him shortly, eyes narrowing. "We know all about your connection to Phantom. Your parents are bigger fools than we thought, if they can't tell that their own son is a ghost."

Danny blinked, laughing a little. "In case you guys haven't noticed, I'm alive." He said, holding up his hands, as best he could when they were bound together. "I'm not a ghost. Those are dead, remember? I think someone would have noticed by now if I was actually undead. And I don't have any connection to Phantom."

"Mmhm." K said simply, raising his brows, before standing up, and unclasping the briefcase. What Danny saw inside of it was enough to make his hands fly up to his mouth, biting back a tide of vomit that rose up to it. A shudder ran down his spine, and he suddenly became all too aware of his own left arm, it suddenly starting to feel as if it were a stranger to him all over again, feeling a throb of pain running through it.

"T-that's an arm." Danny stammered, swallowing back his own bile, unable to bring his eyes away from what the briefcase contained. Clad partially still in a white glove and black hazmat suit, was Phantom's left arm, the one that the Guys in White had severed about a week or so ago now. There were scars and stitch marks on it that indicated that it had been dissected and studied thoroughly. The more he became aware of this, the more his own left arm began to hurt, and the more aware of it being alien to his body he became, suddenly feeling the overwhelming compulsion to do anything to just get it off of him.

In response, Phantom's arm in the case jerked against the straps holding it down, and Danny nearly yelped when he realized this, clamping his right hand back over his mouth. His newly grown left arm seemingly refused to move, as if his brain had already convinced itself that it wasn't his to move, while the one lying confined in the case was.

"Having problems with your left arm, kid?" Operative O asked from the door, a smug look on his face that all but told Danny that they knew they had checkmate. "That's too bad. You know, we have some doctors back at headquarters who could look into that matter for you. After all, our records indicate that you haven't had any medical checkups for the past two years- you shouldn't neglect your health like that."

"Our records also indicate that you took a week off of school after Phantom got his arm cut off. Three of those days you were missing entirely for." K related to him, leaving the case wide open, though his hand lingered tauntingly on the top of it, as if well aware of the pain that it was causing Danny to experience. "You really do look like you're in quite a bit of pain, kid. That's funny, I can't think of anything that could have triggered that."

Danny's eyes narrowed, gritting his teeth, for a moment being in too much pain to give them a response. Phantom's arm in the case continued to jerk and struggle inside of the case, trickles of ectoplasm bleeding anew from various areas on the arm, that had been cut open. Danny could feel cold steel sliding across his left arm, as if he were reliving a dissection that the rest of him hadn't been around for, could feel people picking apart his arm and prodding inside of it, studying every last bit of it.

"The thing is, kid, that when we did a very through study of this arm, we discovered some pretty interesting things about Phantom. Namely that he has DNA." K told him. "I'm sure I don't need to tell you that ghosts aren't supposed to have that. Truth be told kid, we've had suspicions about you for the past couple of months, so when one of our researchers decided to compare it up to a sample that we discreetly obtained of your own, we found that it matched exactly to yours."

K stood up, and Danny could hear the faint whir of an ectogun being charged from behind him, glancing over towards Operative O, realizing that he had pulled one out from his coat. "Still want to go on about you having no connection to Phantom?" K asked him, pulling out his own ectogun, pointing it towards Danny's head.

Gritting his teeth, Danny tried to force back the pain he was experiencing, trying to convince himself that he had no reason to be feeling this. That thing in the case wasn't his arm anymore, and what was currently attached to his body was now the real thing. His left arm finally twitched in response, growing more responsive, but it felt no less alien or unreal, and it didn't manage to chase the pain away, not entirely. The cuffs biting into his current left arm and reminding him that it was very real helped a little, oddly enough.

"I thought this was just going to be questions." Danny said, forcing himself to grin. "I don't know what kind of crap scientist you have, but yeah, I'm going to go on saying I've got no connection to Phantom, because I don't." He glanced between the two, narrowing his eyes. "Shouldn't you point those things elsewhere? I've got rights you know, and I'm pretty sure one of them includes not having dangerous weapons pointed at me when I'm unarmed."

"You might want to read the terms of your own warrant, Phantom." Agent K told him, thrusting the sheet of paper in Danny's face, and for the first time, he took a good look at it, suddenly realizing what had made Mr. Lancer so angry. "We would have approached you sooner, but it took a little longer for us to convince the higher ups to have your basic rights suspended. We might have given you a choice earlier, kid, but at the end of the day, there's only one thing that's going to happen to you- you're going to come with us."

"I don't think so." Danny shook his head, his eyes narrowing. "Warrant or no warrant, I'm not going anywhere with the two of you, and I'm not going anywhere with the Guys in White period. You can't do this to me- I'm human, you know." He told them, in spite of this having been something he had been questioning himself about lately, in spite of the fact that it was printed in black and white on the warrant that Operative K still had thrust in his face, along with the ectogun that was now far too close to his skull for his liking.

Daniel James Fenton, alias Phantom, was no longer considered to be human anymore, and thus no longer was in possession of human rights. If the Guys in White wanted to abduct him here and now, there was nothing that anyone could do to stop them.

"You don't really have a say in that matter." Operative K informed him, tucking the warrant back inside his jacket. "On your feet, Phantom. We're taking you back to headquarters with us, where we've got a nice little cell waiting for you already."

Danny's eyes narrowed, and the smug look on the faces of the two operatives grew as they noticed that they were glowing green. Clenching his left hand, which was finally agreeing with him again, Danny got to his feet.

"That's the right choice." Agent K told him, his ectogun still trained on Danny's head. No doubt that he would fire it at the first sign of resistance.

Which was why he had to make this quick.

"Don't you need to bring your case with you?" Danny asked, keeping his voice low, his eyes fixed on the floor, trying to give them both an impression of defeat. Let them think that they had won this round. Truth be told, Danny wasn't sure what he would after this point, and he was desperately trying not to dwell on what it meant for him now that his human rights had essentially been signed away. He had been debating back and forth if he was still really human ever since his arm had started growing back, but apparently, this had already been decided for him.

He wasn't.

But like hell that meant that he was just going to give in without a fight.

"Oh yes, thank you for reminding me." Operative K said, turning away for a moment. Operative O looked as well, and the second that both men's attention was off of him, Danny clenched his fists, slamming his knee as hard as he could into the pit of Operative K's stomach.

The man's eyes went wide as he doubled over in pain, the air rushing out of him. His grip remained on his ectogun, however, and Danny gritted his teeth, kicking it out of his hand, before yelping avoiding a blast from Operative O's gun. Before Operative K could recover, Danny swept him off his feet with one leg, ducking out of the way as Operative O fired off more rounds. K collapsed to the ground, hitting his head hard against the cold floor of Lancer's office. In any other situation, Danny might actually be concerned about that, but at the moment, he couldn't manage to find it inside of him to be.

"That's it, Phantom, we're doing this the hard way." He could vaguely hear Operative O say, but Danny didn't really register this. He was in fight mode, every muscle itching to get away. Barely dodging another shot from O's ectogun- the Guys in White had been getting better, it seemed- Danny closed the gap between the two of them, aiming a kick square to the man's jaw, hearing a rather loud crack as his foot connected. O's eyes went wide, the pain of a broken jaw briefly overriding his senses, and Danny took that time to go for the door, opening it up in a hurry and dashing out of Lancer's office. Grunting, he fought against the cuffs more, but to his frustration, they wouldn't budge, releasing a shock every time he tried to use one of his powers.

He had been too careless, thinking that staying in the school building would allow him any measure of safety. He could hear K and O getting to their feet in the background, but chose to ignore it, making a mad dash for the front door. He slammed it open hard, coming out to face blue skies- 

And an entire blockade of Guys in White agents, ectoguns all trained on him, and half the town watching. Around the school, a ghost shield had been set up, and he had a hunch this wasn't one he could just pass through on merit of being half human. Dimly he was aware of someone screaming his name in the background, only to be dragged off by one of the Guys in White, only realizing after she was slammed into a police car that it was Jazz. Shortly thereafter, he heard another confrontation, and in any other situation, he was would be surprised to find that Dash Baxter was at the center of it, trying to bum rush some of the Guys in White in an attempt to break the blockade, before he too was forced to the ground and handcuffed, tossed into a police car.

On his shoulder, he could feel the tight grip of Operative O's hand, his nails biting into Danny's skin as he used his other hand to nurse his broken, bloody jaw.

"Now then." Operative K spoke up, training his ectogun on the back of Danny's head. "Take a good long look at the outside world, Phantom, because it's the last time you'll ever be seeing it."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AN- Yeah, this is kind of it. These were all originally a set of of oneshots I wrote around 2013, after which I stopped writing Danny Phantom fic for personal reasons. I just wanted to put 'em all together as a set when I crossposted them here.


End file.
